


A Parting In Alcalá

by lifeisyetfair



Category: Don Carlos - Friedrich Schiller
Genre: Angst, Friendship, Gen, Period-Typical Attitudes to Sex Work, Period-Typical Sexism, Sex Work
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-12
Updated: 2018-11-12
Packaged: 2019-08-22 21:11:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16605524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lifeisyetfair/pseuds/lifeisyetfair
Summary: Posa is leaving for Malta tomorrow. Carlos doesn't know. They go to a brothel, and angst ensues.





	A Parting In Alcalá

**Author's Note:**

> I found this in my drafts for Order of Chivalry, though it's more thematically linked to Shadows. Self-loathing Rodrigo, once again.
> 
> Attitudes to women and to sex work in this piece belong to the characters, not the author.

When he’s finished, he kisses Teresa behind the ear—she’s lying on her stomach, face buried in a pillow, little gasps and teasing words somehow clear nonetheless—and goes downstairs. Carlos is still busy; it’s his first time here. His first time anywhere, as far as Posa knows, and Posa knows everything about Carlos.

  
It doesn’t go both ways. Carlos has no idea that Posa is leaving tomorrow for Malta, Malta which is under siege by the Turks, Malta which is going to fall. His parents bought him the cross of a Maltese knight. It used to be a badge of honor, of independence. These last few days, it’s been anything but. He walks tensed through the streets nowadays, as if someone might spot him and ask, “What are you doing here? What kind of knight are you?” No one does; the voice, he realizes, is his own. And with that the decision was made. No looking back. It’s easy to be brave when you’re utterly without hope.

  
He doesn’t notice the patter of feet on the stairs, doesn’t notice Carlos at all until he’s standing right next to him. They pay—Carlos offers to cover it from the measly allowance his father lets him have, but Posa insists.

  
They walk back in silence. Posa is thinking of Malta, of desperate valor, of Christendom in the balance. Glory. Then why is he sneaking off like a criminal? He’s thought about telling Carlos, he’s come very close. But Carlos will worry. Carlos will make a fuss. Carlos will want to come too, and Posa flinches from the thought. Much better to keep him in ignorance until the event, to let him enjoy this last day.

  
The final parting; Posa puts on a jaunty mask.

  
“Never had anything like that before, did you?” The falseness, the hollowness is so blatant that it seems impossible that Carlos senses nothing amiss. He’s a better liar than he thought, perhaps.

  
Carlos nods, distracted. Suddenly Posa’s vision becomes sharper; every sense focuses in.

  
“What’s wrong?”

  
Carlos says, “Nothing’s wrong. Nothing happened.”

  
“Don’t be ridiculous, Carlos. I can tell.”

  
“I told you, nothing—let go!—oh, well. I wasn’t lying. Nothing did happen. We sat and talked for an hour.”

  
He struggles to hold back laughter. “Sat and…and talked?” Carlos has that naked vulnerable look; he doesn’t want to hurt him. But it is funny, and quintessentially Carlos.

  
“She hates it there,” Carlos says with unexpected fervor. Posa thinks of saucy, curveless Teresa, with her provoking quirk of the mouth. Does she hate it, too? She never seemed much bothered about her lost virtue. He’d always assumed that the sort of girl who ended up there never valued it in the first place.

  
“I know I’m ridiculous,” Carlos continued, “but I couldn’t do it. She had such sad eyes.”

  
Posa stares. He’s reminded, not for the first time, that Carlos is a much better person than he is.


End file.
